“They maintain that liberty is freedom “from”
but true liberty, the
liberty that truly makes
one free, is freedom “to.” The former implies
autonomy; the latter, responsibility.”

On the other hand,
lots of imagery, repetition, alliteration, and so on, without substance
is just fluff. It is not sublime.

As far as your
speech goes, I'm not expecting you to compose a speech that is sublime from
start to finish. That would be really unreasonable. I do, however, hope that you will have a moment or
two of brilliance. That is, at one or two spots
in your speech people will think, "Wow, that couldn't have been said any
better!" or "That was downright, elegant!"

I think an occasional
stroke of genius is quite within your ability, and I'd like to see you try
and compose a speech that elicits the kind of audience response described
above! You can do it!